The musicians have voted, the foundation board has confirmed the choice and the young Finn wants to: Klaus Mäkelä (26) will be the new chief conductor of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra from the 2027/28 season. The next five seasons are a lead up period, in which Mäkelä as ‘artistic partner‘ is already accounting for an increasing number of weeks each year, starting with five weeks from August next season. From 2027, when his chiefship officially starts, he will perform with the orchestra for at least twelve weeks a year. Until then, he will also be present at test plays and touring with the orchestra to prestigious halls and festivals – an important instrument for safeguarding the international reputation as one of the best orchestras in the world.
The Concertgebouw Orchestra announced the appointment on Friday. Mäkelä is the eighth chief conductor in the orchestra’s 134-year history and the successor to Willem Kes, Willem Mengelberg, Eduard van Beinum, Bernard Haitink, Riccardo Chailly, Mariss Jansons and Daniele Gatti. Only Mengelberg was younger when he was 24 years old when he was appointed, Haitink – who is also mentioned in the annals as a very young chef – only became ‘only’ when he was 33. Mäkelä is 31 when he starts.
Music family
Klaus Mäkelä (17 January 1996) comes from a music family. His father is a cellist, his mother a pianist, his grandfather a violinist and sister Ellen dances with the Finnish National Ballet. Klaus plays the cello and sings. At the age of seven, as a boy soprano with the Finnish Opera, he saw conductor Hannu Lintu at work in the opera carmen van Bizet and decides: I am going to be a conductor. “It may be strange to know that as a young child, but music is not about age: it touches you spontaneously,” he says in an interview.
A child who makes such a decision and happens to live in Helsinki has the wind at his side. The conducting class of the legendary pedagogue Jorma Panula at the Sibelius Academy has spawned one success story after another: other famous Finnish conductors such as Esa-Pekka Salonen, Mikko Franck, Sakari Oramo, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Osmo Vänskä and Santtu-Matias Rouvali studied there. Klaus Mäkelä enters Panula’s class when he is twelve years old: extremely young.
Panula does not impose anything on his students, but stimulates them with few words and concise messages (“Help the orchestra, do not disturb it.”). View a documentary about Panula’s class, with images of Klaus Mäkalä as a conducting teenager. His students have to develop their own individualities, based on freedom and trust. In addition, Panula promotes playing an instrument herself: in an orchestra to learn from other conductors, in chamber music ensembles to learn to listen. Mäkelä studies cello in addition to conducting. This summer he is active at the international music festival in Verbier as conductor and cellist: a versatility from which the Concertgebouw Orchestra can also benefit.
In his repertoire Klaus Mäkelä is broad – and a growth diamond. In Amsterdam he has so far led a colorful mix of pieces (Beethoven, Debussy, Dvorak, Tchaikovsky, Shostakovich, Copland) due to the many raids: little profile can be distilled from this. His favorite composers are Bach, Mozart, Schumann, Brahms and Sibelius. In the Amsterdam core repertoire – Mahler, Bruckner – he has already gained experience elsewhere, but not excessively. When he returns to the Concertgebouw Orchestra with title for the first time in August, it will be for Mahler: his Sixth Symphony then forms his baptism of fire (later in ’22/’23 followed by Mozart’s RequiemSibelius and Ravel).
Read also The Finnish conductor Mäkelä, he must have the Concertgebouw Orchestra
Dream debut
After Daniele Gatti’s resignation in 2018, the Concertgebouw Orchestra has been looking for a successor for four years. In 2020, white smoke seemed imminent for the appointment of the Let Andris Nelsons, also one of the candidates in 2014. That nomination fell through.
With Klaus Mäkelä there was a splash of energy and chemistry from the introduction in September 2020: a debut that NRC with five balls was discussed. Mäkelä thought it was “very special”, musicians spoke of the feeling of a to have met “old friend” who gave the orchestra “confidence and hope”†
In classical music, planning is done long in advance, and even after a dream debut, a second chance can be a long time coming. If not with Mäkelä: in the corona time he jumped a few times last minute and the spark flew. That three months after his debut he immediately won the prestigious Christmas matinee was allowed to conduct, released the tongues. Two more successful concert series by the Concertgebouw Orchestra with Mäkelä followed in 2021 – in May and November, before a tour to Hamburg and Iceland. That ‘Amsterdam’ would have already chosen him as the new chef, leaked through the German website crescendo.de but it remained a rumor.
So the deal was not immediately sealed, and that makes sense. Klaus Mäkelä is currently the most wanted young conductor in the world. With his unusual musical talent, broad taste from Bach to contemporary, modest preponderance and beautiful percussion technique, he is making an international Blitz career. In 2019 he was appointed chief conductor in Oslo, in 2020 of the Orchester de Paris, where he started early in September. The contracts with both orchestras run until 2027.
An extra asset is that Mäkelä was signed exclusively by record label Decca in January of this year, as the first conductor in forty years. The complete Sibelius cycle that appeared this year with the Oslo Philharmonic was the first fruit of this. This collaboration also offers opportunities for the Concertgebouw Orchestra.
Joy prevails in the orchestra. Jörgen van Rijen, solo trombonist and chairman of the Artistic Committee said: “Rarely have we experienced such overwhelming support from our musicians for a future chief conductor.” The pool of excellent young conductors is thin and other top orchestras were or are also looking for new chefs. The Münchner Philharmoniker is looking for a successor for Valery Gergiev, the New York Philharmonic for Jaap van Zweden (2024) and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra for Ricardo Muti (2023). The name of Mäkelä also buzzed around with those orchestras.